3. _The Spirits of Just Men Made Perfect._—This expression is found in Heb. 12:23, and seems, by some, to recognize the idea that spirits can exist without the body, and are to be treated as separate entities. Thus interpreted it might appear to give some support to Spiritualism. But it will by no means bear such an interpretation. The apostle is contrasting the privileges of Christians in the present dispensation, with the situation of believers before the coming of Christ. What he sets forth are blessings to be enjoyed in the present tense. Yes, says one, that is just what I believe: We are come to spirits; they are all about us, and tip and talk and write for us at our pleasure. But hold! nothing is affirmed of spirits separately. The whole idea must be taken in. It is the “spirits of _just men_ made perfect;” and the participle “made perfect” agrees with “just men,” or literally “the just made perfect” (δικαίων τετελειωμένων), not with “spirits.” It is the _men_ who are made perfect to whom we are said to have come. But there are only two localities and two periods, in which men are anywhere in the Scriptures said to be made perfect. One is in this life and on this earth, and refers to religious experience (“Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect”); the other is not relative, but actual and absolute, and refers to the future immortal state when all the people of God will enter upon eternal life together (“God having provided some better thing for us, that they [the ancient worthies] without us should not be _made perfect_.” Heb. 11:40). Thus, taken in either of the only two ways possible, the text furnishes no proof of Spiritualism. It doubtless refers to the present state, the expression, “spirits of just men,” being simply a periphrasis for “just men,” the same as the expression, “the God of the spirits of all flesh” (Num. 16:22), means simply “the God of all flesh,” and the words “your whole spirit, and soul, and body” (1 Thess. 5:23), means simply the whole person.